Thoughts on recent Ninth Circuit and California appellate cases from Professor Shaun Martin at the University of San Diego School of Law.

Wednesday, May 07, 2008

People v. Litmon (Cal. Ct. App. - April 23, 2008)

Not much today; by lunchtime, only a single opinion from the Ninth Circuit and nothing new from the California Court of Appeal. So a sleepy Hump Day.

Which gives me the opportunity to go back and write, if only briefly, about a very good opinion I read a couple of weeks ago.

I really, really like this opinion by Justice Elia. It's not only persuasive, but it is manifestly written with a sense of justice and the importance of the subject matter. Shorthand for what it says: Liberty matters. You deserve some sort of a timely hearing to challenge your involuntary commitment to a mental hospital.

I don't uniformly get a palpable sense that an opinion deeply and profoundly "gets" what Due Process means. But I do here.